Adobe Audition mix, sounds completely unmixed!

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
January 23, 2020
2 replies
3623 views

Hello community,

So here is a strange problem I have run into with Audition and I fail to understand... I've been using Audition for the last 4 years, excellent workflow.. Then just as I updated to the 2020 version really weird stuff happened.
1- The samller problem. When I save my session (working on a video) the video playback goes black, the track is there but I have to Link it again. Happens randomly ...
2- The really NOT COOL problem:
I use the same plugins, same settings, same audio interface... all same I used with the 2019 version. I mix my tracks, mainly music, sfx, dialogue, then bounce all.
Surprise, the mixdown sounds COMPLETELY different, dull as if run through LPF, gain reduced (not the -3 db one), mids up, and not at all what it sounds in Audition. So, at the same time, if I play it in Audition, the mix is fine, then I play the exported file: the mix is messed up.
I imported the SAME mixdown tracks to Audition many times to test and well, they even look different, and sound bad. No plugins involved , not even the native Adobe ones.

I tried this without any plugins, absolutely none and I get the same result.

I suspected the MAC first, then I have LPX and ProTools 2019 in the same machine and they work fine. I even loaded the same OMF into each and still Audition is the only DAW that seems to get things done awefully in the mix. I used the same plugins in all 3.

Anyone with similar problems? your help is so much appreciated.

Thanks

This topic has been closed for replies.

chuckhawks

Known Participant

I am running a Mac with Catalina and on the 2020 version of Audition. I have similar but perhaps not exactly the same issue. When I mix clips to a file, the dialogue clip (podcast) is WAY lower - like 6 to 8dB lower than when in the Multitrack view. The surrounding music and open/close dialogue clips are unaffected but the main interview clip (using a mild DeReverb plugin only, nothing else) is not at all what was mixed down.

This is extremely frustrating (and unpredictable as sometimes it doesn't do it - same effects applied, etc.) and seriously has me questioning the integrity of Audition mixes. Am I going to have to worry about this in a music production or something more complicated than a 4-track podcast?? I can't afford to waste time putzing with an inaccurate DAW.

I've found no solutions anywhere for this situation (Pan Laws are not the issue and did nothing when I switched it from -3dB and restarted the app) and I'm going out of my mind trying to work with this issue.

SteveG_AudioMasters_

Community Expert

There's no evidence at all to suggest that Audition does anything to mixes other than what you tell it to. If this wasn't the case, there would be massive levels of complaint about it, and we'd have heard about it from loads of people. If you really have got a case of this happening, it would have to be reproducible before anybody would look at it. We'd need a sample of the audio concerned, and the session file, at a bare minimum. This would go for both of you - these being the only instances that have been reported here.

chuckhawks

Known Participant

@chuckhawks. @Narlysoftware
I am so relieved someone else in the world is having this very very strange problem. I am mostly surprised by the lack of Adobe's support as well or sending any fixes about this.

I have run all types of tests and still I am getting this problem with mixes on Audition, which I actually only use to clean up some VO now and doing my mixes on other DAW.
I work for a multimillion media company, so the guys sent a crew from the IT to inspect this Audition behavior. This was done with I, and two of my sound engineers colleagues, and I can ensure you we all know very well what we are doing.
We tried this on a blank reformatted MAC, a completely new out of the box MAC and the old MAC. We tried the phase cancellation (using the same track and inverting phase like @Narlysoftware's solution), We tried comparing tracks through WLM Plus reports, spectral analysis with Cedar plugins, and an external analog unit, we tried taking Audition mixed stems and opening them on THREE DAWs and comparing with the same methods, and the fun part was that they sound different in the three DAWs. No not the -3db thing and not the DAW difference. They simply seem to have something encoded within (not my specialty here). We really went far with testing.

The only way Audition worked normally was when it was installed on a brand new MAC (Catalina), ALONE. Audition is the only program installed and running on the machine with its native VSTs. Nothing else.

Now, we have lots and lots of software licenses that are essential to our work, what to do about these? Maybe this is Apple's Catalina problem but it needs to be acknowledged because the moment we started installing and loading other VSTs, things went coo-coo again.

I suspect Waves plugins as well. SteveG, maybe you should try this and then tell us what you've got. I stopped wasting my time and just had a month of hellish adaptation to other DAWs just because I felt highly deceived from Audition. However, Waves plugins (no matter which one), seem all together with Catalina and Izotope to make Audition useless for the moment.

THANK YOU, Hamzamisterconductor for taking all the time to go thru all the tests you did!! That's pretty extensive.

It's interesting you bring that (VST) issue up as a possible cause! The reason I say this is:

I don't have any 3rd party VSTs installed on my Mac where I see this issue BUT...

In the studio, we have a Windows PC (that recently got updated to the latest CC s/w, ugh...) where I was able to finish my project because the problem was not evident. I just installed Izotope RX 7 on that machine and out of curiosity I opened one of the podcast files from the 'problem' project in RX 7 (not Audition) and the file plays at 1/5th speed like there's a sample rate issue going on. The same exact, unaltered file plays perfectly in Audition.

I reached out to Izotope support (they actually HAVE a support solution) and they are scratching their heads over it. They agree that it looks like a sample rate conversion issue but all params seem to be set correctly.

I bring this up because Audition seems to be the common denomenator and you mentioned that the same mix sounded different across your several DAWs. I'm not ready to point the finger at Audition (only) just yet on this new development but I do find it very interesting that a file edited in Audition has an issue in 3rd party app that also seems to cause Audition problems.

I'm now using more fingers to scratch my head and pull hair out... This is VERY strange and immeasurably frustrating; not to mention expensive when considering the downtime caused by having to take a unit out of service due to the issue. (ProTools isn't installed on the Mac; yet.)

SteveG_AudioMasters_

Community Expert

Well, it's a Mac, so I'm groping in the dark a bit here... but are you using Catalina? We know that there are some security-related issues surrounding that, and moving files in and out of Audition. These are currently being worked on.

H

hamzamisterconductorAuthor

Participant

Thank you Steve, that was a fast answer, and sorry I just posted it before going in a weel vacation ....
Well, no I am still on Mojave 10.14.5,

My personal computer has the Catalina and strangely Audition works fine there. I do not use it often though.
One thing popped to my mind is:
This sound confusion happened first after I installed VLC player, could that be the reason somehow?

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